Leslie Cane Articles

By: Leslie Cane: When you’re married but separated, it’s very common to constantly evaluate what is going on with your spouse. You want to know what he’s thinking, how he’s feeling, and what all of this might mean in terms of what he wants moving forward. This can be especially true if you want to save your marriage. But, all of this evaluating of feelings can bring about some troubling suspicions. Many wives in this situation begin to feel that the marriage (and the feelings within it) have become lopsided. In short, she believes that she cares much more than he does.

She might say, “when my husband and I were first married, I honestly believe that, at that time, we loved one another equally. What I mean by that is that we were equally committed to our marriage and we shared the same loving feelings. However, as my husband became more successful and I began to focus more on our children, I believe that there was most definitely a shift. I became the spouse who always made the marriage a priority, whereas my husband had to be constantly reminded of it. Over time, this seriously damaged our relationship and now we are separated. My husband has said that he isn’t sure that he wants to divorce, especially since we have small children. However, I am not sure if I believe this because he puts absolutely no effort into communicating with me during our separation. I always have to reach out. He doesn’t return calls. I’m always the one wondering how he feels and what is going to happen. He doesn’t seem to care. Part of me feels like if I filed for divorce tomorrow, he would be secretly happy because then he wouldn’t be the bad guy. I’ve pushed for counseling, but he says that he’s not ready for this quite yet. So I’m just in limbo and I’m always feeling like I’m much more invested than he. Does this mean that our marriage is doomed?”

Not necessarily. I was in the same situation. I definitely cared much more deeply than my husband did during our separation. But this didn’t mean the end of our marriage. The research that I’ve done on this topic may reassure you.

Understanding The Realities Of Asymmetrical Commitment:  I researched this topic during my own separation. This “lopsided” relationship that you describe actually has a name – asymmetrical commitment. Psychologists have studied it and some feel that, in excessive cases, this type of relationship can result in frustration for both sides because the least committed person can exploit the relationship while feeling entrapped. On the flip side, researchers have noted that asymmetrical marriages do not always result in divorce – especially when it is the woman who is more committed. In fact, asymmetrical relationships where the man was the least committed were not more likely to break up than symmetrical relationships (with equal levels of commitment.)

You can speculate as to the cause of this, but I’d suspect that the men in this type of relationship may not be as willing to end the relationship as you might fear. At least in my case, I was always sure that my husband was going to file for divorce at any time. He did not. Luckily, I was able to bring about some change before he ever took that action, but he was unhappy for some time and he took no action to end our marriage. (That doesn’t mean that he wouldn’t have, if given more time. And we did separate.)

The Dulling Or Delay Of Feelings: This apathy or delay doesn’t mean that you should just ignore what your gut feelings are telling you, but I don’t think that you need to panic, either. It’s common for people in marital separations to try to dull their feelings. It can be painful to be separated from someone who you love, so it can feel easier if you dull those loving feelings (which can’t easily be expressed while you are separated.)

This doesn’t mean that those same feelings can’t or won’t return once the circumstances change. Thankfully, I definitely feel that our relationship is mostly equal today, now that we have reconciled.

None of this means that you have to continue on feeling as if you are the only one who cares. In my experience, sometimes it is better to just back away a tiny bit. What I mean by that is that you try to keep yourself busy so that you aren’t constantly second-guessing how he feels (or what he potentially doesn’t feel.) When I forced myself to do this, I eventually found that my husband became somewhat interested and invested again. I just had to make myself less of a pest and he just needed some time to process what was happening.

While I was continuing to want a daily inventory of what he was feeling and thinking, I was only making things worse and making him think more negatively about our marriage. Once I gave him the space to come to his own conclusions, he thought more positively of both the marriage and of me. We had a lot of work to do, but eventually, things felt much more even between us.  You can read about how we reconciled at http://isavedmymarriage.com.

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